John Lescroart - Damage

Eztli sat thinking in the driver’s seat of the Beemer, ideas dancing around in his mind, until after a couple more minutes, the door to the Center opened again and the woman came out onto the sidewalk with the dog on its leash, which she then attached to one of the legs of the park bench. When she patted the slats of the seat, the dog obediently hopped up and settled itself on the bench.

Eztli waited and watched for a few more minutes. The street was slowly waking up. The woman in the Center turned the CLOSED sign over to OPEN, then came out and put two large red dishes-food and water-on the sidewalk under the bench. The dog hopped down, ate, and drank some water. Then, as dogs do, it sniffed around and anointed the leg of the park bench before it went back to its place up on the bench and stretched out to sleep in the morning sunshine.

If Glitsky’s three-bedroom flat had a characteristic feature, it was that the thirteen hundred square feet of it always felt crowded. When he’d first moved in here with Flo thirty-some years before, they’d already had two boys, Isaac and Jacob, and within the next year added Orel. After Flo had died of ovarian cancer, the three boys filled up the two bedrooms off behind the kitchen, and a housekeeper, Rita, had taken up nearly full-time residence behind a screen in the barely serviceable living room. By the time Treya and her daughter, Raney, moved in with Abe and Orel, the household reverberated with the noise of the two teenagers, and now they, too, had gone only to be replaced by Rachel and Zachary, who were themselves not exactly monklike in their habits.

Now there was no trace of any of the children, nor of Treya for that matter, and Glitsky sat drinking his morning tea at the table in his tiny kitchen, experiencing the unaccustomed silence as a palpable and ominous presence.

When the telephone rang, he had just picked up his cup and the brrring was loud and jarring and unexpected enough that he twitched and spilled some tea over the cup’s edge and into his lap. Jumping up, furious at himself, brushing his pants to get the liquid off, he finally made it over to where the phone hung on the wall and picked up the receiver, growling his name into it.

“Abe. It’s Vi. Sorry to call you at home, but you weren’t at the office yet and I thought I’d take a chance.”

The implied rebuke did nothing to elevate Glitsky’s mood. “No problem,” he said. “What’s up?”

“I wondered if you happened to see the ‘Our Town’ column today.”

“Not yet, no.”

“Well, then it’s lucky I reached you so I could give you a heads-up. She’s pretty much all over you about your handling, or mishandling, I should say, of this Janice Durbin thing. I got a call from Hizzoner first thing this morning-and yes, if you’re wondering, at home-and he read me the riot act about what’s going on and I must say this wasn’t the way I envisioned spending my first month or so on this job, defending myself and my chief of homicide every time I turn around.”

“She’s an irresponsible lunatic,” Glitsky said.

“That may be true, but she’s got Leland’s attention in a big way, and he’s all but screaming for your head.”

Glitsky let out a deep sigh. “You know, Vi, at this point, I’m almost tempted to say give it to him. Who needs the aggravation? If you ask me to, I’ll resign right now.”

“Don’t tempt me, will you? I don’t want you to resign, especially over this, which strikes me as you just trying to do your job. Not to mention, imagine my future if I cave to this kind of idiocy the first time it rears its ugly head. But I’ve got to have some answers for Leland and for the public before this gets any further out of hand.”

Again, Glitsky blew out heavily. “What’s she say? Marrenas.”

“Basically it’s the same old. In your zeal to get Ro Curtlee back behind bars, you’re ignoring a far better suspect who’s right under your nose.”

“And who’s that?”

“The Durbin husband, who doesn’t have an alibi and is also evidently having an affair with one of his employees.”

“She printed that?”

“To that effect. And of course then the question is, why aren’t you concentrating on him instead of picking on Ro?”

“Maybe because Ro did it. Although, for the record, you should know that I’ve interviewed the husband at least twice already and plan to do it again because it’s such a good time. Meanwhile, you’ll notice I haven’t arrested anybody yet-Ro or Michael Durbin or anybody else-and that’s usually a clue that I don’t have a viable suspect.”

“Well, if that’s the case, it might be in your best interest to prepare some kind of statement to that effect, and I’ll do the same.”

“It should go without saying.”

“Yes, well, that’s not how it seems to be playing this time.”

“How about just saying we can’t comment because the investigation is continuing?”

“How’d that fly last time you tried it? I think we’ve got to be a little more forthcoming. I’m serious here, Abe. I don’t know how long I’m going to be able to keep my own job if this keeps up. I’m on thin enough ice as it is. Let’s try a little proactive appeasement, how’s that sound? Put on a little show for the home team.”

Fifty-eight people were in attendance at the crematorium service. Glitsky sat in the back row listening and taking notes as the relatives and acquaintances of Janice Durbin stood up to give their eulogies. A borderline tearful but controlled Michael Durbin got up and extolled his wife as a partner, provider, helpmate, and mother. Kathy Novio, breaking down several times, invited everyone over to her house for the reception afterward, then talked about her sister’s childhood, her passion for her family and patients and career, and her belief that the world was a good place, a safe place, and how in spite of what had happened to her, Kathy was sure that Janice would not want anyone to come away from this ceremony with negative feelings or despair. Two other girlfriends, one from college and one from medical school, talked about how much fun she’d been, how dedicated a friend. Her pastor, who appeared to have known her fairly well, talked in a resounding baritone about her volunteer activities with the mentally handicapped, her generosity, and her faith.

It was, Glitsky thought, pretty much the usual stuff. But amid the tributes to Janice Durbin’s life, he found himself unable to stop wondering which of the guests here, and he thought it must have been one of them, had given her chlamydia. Or if Janice had spread the disease to someone in this room.

While the last of the talks was winding down, he went out and stood by the back door and let the crowd flow out past him. He didn’t know if anyone recognized him, and he certainly didn’t pick up any sense of hostility from any of the guests for the way he was screwing up the investigation into Janice’s murder.

Glitsky had met all the kids and the Novios the previous Saturday, and now when the families came out, straggling behind the rest of the crowd, he saw that the trauma of the past few days had taken a heavy toll.

Kathy, in stark contrast to her talk inside, was nearly ashen with anger and grief. She held hands with both of her daughters, glistening eyes straight ahead. A couple of steps behind her, her husband walked in a kind of stiff-legged attention. The elder Durbin boy, Jon, his face a cloud of fury, cleared the door and immediately walked away from the general direction of the crowd. Michael Durbin, following, walking next to the middle son, Peter, on one side of him, and his daughter, Allie, holding his hand on the other, called out to him, but Jon half turned and waved a dismissive hand and kept walking away.